RUBIZMO

Project

RUBIZMO

Economic activities in rural areas

RUBIZMO will identify and promote opportunities for more diverse economic activities in rural areas that can bring about added value, job creation and a more sustainable use of resources. The project aims to stimulate investments into a range of rural economic sectors, with a particular focus on supporting the valorization of local assets, and exploitation of unused resources. RUBIZMO brings together 16 expert organizations from 11 countries, striking a balance between East-West, and North-South Europe, focusing on European countries with large rural populations. RISE coordinates this consortium in which ZABALA Innovation Consulting also participates. The project has been funded under H2020 and will last until April of 2021.

This project has received funding from the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement Nº 773621

16

PARTNERS

36

MONTHS

€ 3.9M

TOTAL BUDGET

11

COUNTRIES

In one click

The objective of RUBIZMO will be to stimulate the large-scale deployment of successful, localized and innovative business models in the food sector, bio-based value chains and eco-system services. By making new linkages among sectors, businesses, producers, consumers, and markets, RUBIZMO will create shared values among local communities and help to increase rural resilience through diversification. This deployment will foster the modernization and sustainable growth of rural economies while providing significant potential to generate jobs, to create added-value, social cohesion and resilience, and contribute to more sustainable use of human and natural resources.

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Solutions:

RUBIZMO will support modernization and sustainable growth in rural economies while providing significant potential to create added-value, help communities to become more resilient, and contribute to sustainable use of resources. To achieve this, RUBIZMO will identify 50 successful business cases and 20 new business models and explore conditions for replication to developfour practical, user-oriented tools: A virtual library of business cases, to inspire and inform potential entrepreneurs about business opportunities; Guidelines on creating favorable conditions for the deployment of innovative business models, to help public authorities and rural networks create adequate framework conditions for rural innovation; A toolkit for clustering and network development in rural areas; A transformation support tool, to help individual entrepreneurs understand which business models are best adapted to their situation, and how to go about implementing change.

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Impacts:

RUBIZMO will directly benefit rural entrepreneurs and existing rural networks by providing improved tools and guidelines to enhance entrepreneurship in rural areas. This will support the development of innovative value chains delivering competitive products and services in rural areas and contribute to make rural communities more resilient to global economic and environmental changes. The main expected impacts of RUBIZMO will be: To develop improved tools for entrepreneurship in rural areas. To improve knowledge of business models emerging in rural areas. To increase the potential for rural economic diversification, added value and job creation in a variety of rural areas. Making rural economies and societies more resilient to global changes.To improve the delivery of ecosystem services resulting from innovative forms of valorization.

Rural areas are depleting of economic activities, public services and educational opportunities. The emergence of new bio-based value chains, increasing demand for ecosystem services, and new communication technologies has the potential to create opportunities in these increasingly depopulated areas. RUBIZMO will enable to exploit these opportunities making rural areas more attractive for company creation and development and entrepreneurial activity at large.